Asian Cinema's 20 Greatest Fight Scenes

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The most classic fights to ever come out of Asia. You wanna fight?

By Stephen Lambrechts

One of the films that IGN's staff are most excited about right now would have to be The Raid, an Indonesian effort that's widely being described as the most incredible action and fighting movie in decades. Seeing the latest footage got us thinking - how does it truly stack up against the best Asian cinema has to offer? With that in mind, we've compiled the 20 fight scenes we regard as the most electrifying and just plain jaw dropping that have ever been choreographed and committed to film.

To be very clear - these fight scenes all come out of Asian cinema exclusively. Those upset that classic fight scenes from films like Enter the Dragon, Kiss of the Dragon and Game of Death didn't make the cut should note that those films are ineligible due to being Hollywood productions. We'd also like to stress that for the purposes of focusing more on martial arts battles, we've excluded samurai films.

So without further ado, let's watch some good ol' fashioned ass-whupping.

20

The Invincible Armor

Released: 1977

This awesome fight scene begins with our hero Chow Lu Fung (John Liu) taking down four ninjas with his incredible spear techniques, only to then have to challenge Minister Cheng (Jang Lee Hwang), a martial arts expert that has mastered the legendary Iron Armor technique - a skill that pretty much makes the user withstand almost any attack. This leads to some awesome yet hilarious scenes of Minister Cheng cackling with laughter as John tries desperately to find his weak-spot. This battle is so epic it takes place over two videos!

19

Merantau

Released: 2009

Now we're talkin'! From Gareth Evans, director of The Raid, comes his fantastic film Merantau. It's the story of Yuda (Iko Uwais, also in The Raid), a young man skilled in the deadly Indonesian martial art of Silat, who sets off on his 'merantau'; the age-old rite of passage for young men in the village. Yuda gets caught between a young girl and her younger brother, and a group of sex traffickers, and must do everything he can to protect his new friends. In many ways the film is like a dead-serious Ong Bak, but I personally prefer it because the stakes are much more important. Iko Uwais might not have the incredible power and technique of Tony Jaa, but his acting skills and charisma leave him for dead.

Stephen Chow's zany brand of martial arts comedy was never more perfect than in his film Kung Fu Hustle. Combining lo-fi special effects and real stunt men, Chow managed to create a scene that was much more engaging and fun than The Matrix Reloaded's big brawl, with the added bonus of being intentionally funny!

17

The Iceman Cometh

Released: 1989

The Iceman Cometh is a tale of a Ming Dynasty royal guard (played by martial arts sensation Yuen Biao), and the criminal scumbag that he is chasing (Wah Yuen). The two men get frozen, only to be thawed-out in modern-day Hong Kong with a score to settle! The two are incredible swordsmen, so think of it as a light-hearted Highlander, with a touch of Demolition Man. The movie is great, and the end battle is one for the ages.

As the first entry of director Zhang Yimou's epic martial arts trilogy, Hero blew audiences away upon release with its beautiful, dance-like choreography and colour-based, seasonal segments. My personal favourite is from the blue segment, and is a battle between Jet Li and Tony Leung. It's martial arts used as poetry.

15

The Man From Nowhere

Released: 2010

Jeong-beom Lee's brutal Korean thriller The Man From Nowhere contains one of the greatest knife-fights ever filmed. A quiet pawnshop keeper with a past as a special agent (Bin Won) is trying to retrieve the eyeballs of a young girl from a bunch of organ-traffickers. Things get bloody. The reason it works so well is because of how intense and violent the fight is. The use of POV shots makes it extra-effective.

14

SPL (a.k.a. Kill Zone)

Released: 2005

Martial arts legend Donnie Yen takes this knife-wielding fool on with a retractable baton, and by golly, it's glorious. This goon gets his head tenderised right before Yen takes him on bare-handed. So incredibly satisfying!

13

Way of the Dragon

Released: 1972

Bruce Lee vs. Chuck Norris. Do we really have to say anything more? Okay, well this climactic battle between two of martial arts cinema's biggest names is especially cool due to its backdrop of the Roman Coliseum, but more awesome than that is the way that director Bruce Lee gives the cat in the scene its own crazy 70s zoom shot. It's also worth noting that the hair on Norris' back had yet to make its way to Norris' face by this stage in his career.

The incredible hallway fight from Park Chan-wook's classic film Oldboy made its mark by having the entire fight sequence between Choi Min-sik and roughly twenty thugs take place within a single side-on tracking shot that never cuts away. It took three days of shooting to get this scene right, but the result was clearly worth it. This is not a fight about impeccable martial arts moves - this is about a self-taught man savagely fighting to stay alive while being wildly outnumbered. Hammer time.

This virtuoso tracking shot of a fight scene by director Prachya Pinkaew through multiple floors of a building is up there with John Woo's hospital shootout tracking shot in Hard Boiled. It's a remarkable accomplishment, though it must be noted that this shot's fight choreography is more simplistic than the rest of the film. It's understandable when you consider how much is going on in this scene. There's more Tony Jaa action coming later on this list...